The following text may have been generated by Optical Character Recognition, with varying degrees of accuracy. Reader beware!

20 Stoufville Sun-Tribune | Thursday, September 3, 2015 | Michael Bucci always made time for others By Tim Kelly ife L stories tkelly@yrmg.com A celebration of lives well lived and people well loved Read more Life Stories on yorkregion.com he doorbell woke up Lucy Bucci at 1:30 a.m. on Aug. 29, 2014. Her son, Michael, hadn't arrived home to Richmond Hill following recreation hockey in Scarborough. She went to the door, wondering who it could be? Her first foggy thought was Michael had forgotten his house key or maybe her daughter, Melissa, had forgotten hers. But when she peeked through the window, Lucy saw two police officers and two women from victim services. She soon got the news every parent dreads. "Your son was in a terrible car accident," the officer said. "He succumbed to his injuries at the scene of the accident." Lucy said her husband, Bruce, with serious health concerns of his own, was hysterical at the news and her daughter was frozen stiff at the top of the stairs. As for Lucy, her brain simply shut down, then and there. The next day at 7 a.m., she went to the coroners' office in Toronto to identify her only son. "I saw him on a screen. The detectives were still there. He was just smiling, with a beautiful little smile with his eyes closed. He looked angelic," Lucy said. "It's just a horrible, horrible T Michael Bucci and his girlfriend, Jessica Couto. thing to go through." Lucy desperately wanted to know what caused the single car crash on Elgin Mills Road in Richmond Hill that took Michael's life at the age of 27. But nobody could give her any answers. "It eats away at you -- initially, every day I was searching and searching for an answer. I met with the coroner twice. "No alcohol, no sickness, no drugs, no texting. How did this happen? Is it mechanical? Is it human error? What caused this? The officer stated the only person who knows is not here to tell us," she said. Lucy only has memories of Michael now, the young man she remembers vividly. "I miss that boy. I miss his walking in saying, `Hello, hello, what's for dinner, what are we eatin' tonight,' cause he was all about food," she said in a recent phone conversation. Michael was the kind of man she said, who, "no matter where he went, he stopped and spoke to every single person, even if he hadn't seen them in 15 years, he stopped and talked to them." "So many people in the community have told me he came up to them and said, `How's it going, how are you doing?' Michael was such a regular young man, with goals and dreams of the future. He attended elementary school at Our Lady Help of Christian and Father Henri Nouwen and went to high school at St Theresa of Liseuix. With fiancée Jessica Couto, he had plans to marry this past April. The two had been together five years at the time of the crash, had pur- chased a house, were saving for their future together and were big Maple Leaf fans. Michael was a Red Seal electrician, helped out his grandparents in Caledon by mowing the grass in summer and covering the airconditioner in winter. He was a true outdoorsman, according to his mom, a videographer who started a small business, Camvast Productions with two friends doing videos and photography and produced a book called Glory and Triumph. His mom called him "a mover and shaker." Lucy and Melissa have had a tough year. Bruce, who has scleroderma, an autoimmune disease that is a chronic hardening and tightening of the skin, is now terminally ill with lung cancer. Just 54, Bruce is back and forth to Sunnybrook Hospital and is very sick. "I haven't been able to take a breath," Lucy said in mid-August. She has plans to have a memorial for Michael, but they are on hold for now. She only knows that she wishes she had travelled more with her son when she had the chance. "I was one of these parents, I would read about it in the paper and hear it on the news and I'd say, `Oh my God, that poor family and on and on.' "When I went through this I said, `Oh, this wasn't supposed to be me.'" L ife stories "Adored by children, universally respected and an inspiration to her peers, Mrs. McCluskey was a tireless volunteer, quick to deflect the praise heaped on her." Celebrate a life well lived! Your community newspaper is celebrating the achievements and contributions of everyday, ordinary people, who have affected the lives of others in extraordinary ways. Leaving a lasting impression on the community, our award-winning journalists will write a fitting tribute in memory of those who have a special story to share. Through your community newspaper and LifeNews.ca, we celebrate those no longer with us and remember the memories we share. FOR MORE INFORMATION or to contact one of our professional writers please call Newmarket/Aurora EG Tracy Kibble ..................905-853-8888 Georgina & Bradford Ted McFadden .............905-853-8888 Markham, Bernie O'Neill ...............905-294-2200 Stouffville Jim Mason ....................905-640-2612 Vaughan & King Kim Champion ..............905-264-8703 Richmond Hill/Thornhill Marney Beck ................905-294-2200